Supervision of doctoral thesis

Each doctoral researcher must have a principal supervisor, who is responsible for guiding the doctoral researcher throughout the training. The principal supervisor already discusses with the future doctoral researcher before the doctoral researcher applies to the Graduate School.

Who can be a supervisor?

  • The principal supervisor must be a professor or a docent of the University of Oulu.
  • The principal supervisor may also be a person working at the University of Oulu who holds qualifications equivalent to a docent/adjunct professor, and whose competence has been verified through external evaluation.
  • The principal supervisor can have at most 10 doctoral researchers under their principal supervision. If the suggested principal supervisor does not meet this requirement, they must provide a well-justified statement of the resources of the planned supervision to UniOGS.
  • A doctoral researcher can have one or two co-supervisors , if of doctor-level or higher. UniOGS recommends that each doctoral researcher have at least one co-supervisor.
  • A degree supervisor is required if the principal supervisor or any of the docent-level co-supervisors does not work at the University of Oulu. The degree supervisor is a professor of the doctoral researcher's major subject or the same field and monitors that the doctoral researcher follows the practices of the University of Oulu and UniOGS.
  • A close person cannot be an official supervisor (Administrative Procedure Act 28 §)

Roles and responsibilities of doctoral researchers and supervisors

The most important roles and responsibilities of doctoral researchers and their supervisor(s) are described below. Doctoral researcher and supervisors agree on the supervisory arrangements, and the process of the doctoral research in supervision plan. The goal is to encourage the doctoral researchers and their supervisors to discuss common principles and views with respect to the organisation of the research, funding, studies and other topics related to doctoral education, as well as the detailed division of labor best suited to the needs of the training relationship.